Heroes, fake hope, and real hope in the Matrix

The occasion for this article is the controversy swirling around Edward Snowden, who recently exposed secret programs of the National Security Agency.

It’s about one corner of that controversy: should we accept him as a hero even if the possibility exists that he isn’t?

The Matrix is designed to stimulate certain emotions.

For example: “We had a hero. Then he was taken down. Now we will feel sadness, desolation, and eventually nostalgia for what might have been.”

For example: “We have a hero. Let’s not look too closely at what he is. Now we will feel hope, a joy at his victories, and a confirmation of our deepest dreams.”

In both examples, the vast majority of people are an Audience. They experience a vicarious sequence of emotions, by proxy.

Proxy equals passivity at the core of consciousness. It is in that deep passivity that the labyrinthine Matrix maintains its hold.

And to disturb the passivity in any way brings out complaints and protests. Their ultimate translation is: “Don’t bother me, I’m sleeping. I’m the Audience.”

Understand that we’re not talking about a person who, inspired by a hero, takes stock, and then swings into powerful action. No, we’re talking about spectatorship.

True inspiration leads to action.

The Matrix is about a round of feelings that dead-end.

Whereas real hope rides on the back of action.

But for most people, action is out of the question, because they can’t imagine what it would be. Nor can they find within themselves a profound and stirring desire that ignites imagination.

Working in toward the center of themselves from either desire or imagination, they draw a blank. The motor spins, but there is no traction, no signal that takes them out into the world.

They settle for fake hope, and when the source of that hope (a hero) is impugned, they boil and rage. Then they stifle those feelings.

They settle on: “Don’t bother me, I’m sleeping.”

If you tell them the world is being run by criminals, they say you are promoting futility. But what they really mean is, their pipe dreams that keep them in a hopeful state of suspended animation are being disturbed.

They are in a quiet war with themselves over the question: Can I create something powerful and meaningful?

Up until now, the only thing they’ve been able to create is a reaction against anyone who intrudes on their core trance-sleep.

But I’m the exact opposite of a pessimist. I know, as in KNOW, that the INDIVIDUAL has freedom and power. Because, when all is said and done, that’s who he is.

And who he is can never be eradicated.

The requirement that significant and sweeping change for the better must happen in the next six months is the fantasy of a self-entitled child. It is the whine and the complaint of a person who has already given up, but refuses to admit it.

Short-term battles for a good world were lost a long time ago. The long-term battle never ends. It is going on right now.

Groups begging at the door of entrenched power for crumbs are going nowhere. That is no revolution. That is no liberation.

It’s a pathetic stage play.

Every individual is free, whether he wants to be or not. This freedom isn’t given to him or made legal by any mechanism.

Freedom is something you take because it is yours. You don’t ask for it. You don’t wait for it. You don’t long for it. You don’t inquire about it.

Neither do you interfere with the freedom of another.

With these two facts established, your life is your own. Your life is yours to invent. If you don’t invent it, it becomes a habit, a routine. It becomes an occasion for false hope, with which you can entertain yourself forever.

Freedom isn’t just a steady-state hum. It is the opportunity to imagine without limit and then create futures and realities that would otherwise never exist.

It is the opportunity for endless and deep and high and wide Desire, which you can fulfill by making it fact in the world.

To deny these things in the service of some other aspiration leads back to the core trance and the big sleep, by whatever name.

All entrenched and monopolistic power is a crime. Its opposite is decentralization, the nemesis of kings, monarchs, and fascists.

To understand how decentralizing can be accomplished is not merely to understand a program or a system. The understanding comes through unchained imagining, and then uncompromising action based on it.

“But I can’t!”

Then you stay in the trance, the land of false hope, the worship of heroes, the need for nostalgia.

This is neither unfair nor fair, neither just nor unjust. It simply is.

Infiltrated through the culture, there are many so-called spiritual teachings and maxims that excuse and even glorify the human need for passivity. These teachings (propaganda) have their roots in ancient societies that were built on the injustice of a rigid caste system.

These teachings were imported into modern civilization to soften the blow sustained by the widening separation between the haves and the have-nots.

“If it was meant to be, it will happen. Otherwise, it won’t.”

“The universe will tell you what to do. Wait for its message.”

“Remove desire from your life. It’s the source of suffering.”

“Live your life by accepting what is.”

“Happiness is achieved by being satisfied with what you already have.”

“Above all: patience.”

The popularity of these and other similar teachings are a testament to the big sleep.

The elevation of so-called heroes, at a distance, is merely another strategy to extend that sleep.

Otherwise, people elevate heroes as a reason to a) hope and b) then do nothing.

The elites of this world are perverse artists who paint reality for us. Understanding that, we can become our own artists of reality.

What does that entail? We’ll never know until we start painting. Then things will become clear.

In the battle to decentralize entrenched fascist power, there are already answers and strategies out there. There are thousands more answers that remain to be imagined and created by free, powerful, independent and intensely creative people.

The future is unshaped space and time. You can either shape it or let it shape you.

The latter decision is usually undertaken on an unconscious basis, replete with excuses, denials, complaints, maudlin sentiment, false hope, nostalgia, and hero-worship. It’s a cover story for an op of personal surrender.